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Towards a Conceptual Design Framework for Emotional Communication Systems for Long-Distance Relationships

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Interactivity, Game Creation, Design, Learning, and Innovation (ArtsIT 2019, DLI 2019)

Abstract

Couples living in long-distance relationships (LDRs) may lack ways to keep emotionally connected. Previous research has presented a wealth of systems and user studies that offer insights of individual systems and their user interface designs. These studies have revealed a multitude of design attributes of the relatedness strategies of LDRs and the user interfaces used in computer-mediated communication (CMC) systems for LDRs. In this paper, we synthesise the multitude of different design attributes, and present a design framework that addresses the five main areas of LDR systems: users (the remote couple), the LDR itself, the used technology, the design of the device, interaction, nature of messages and supported connectedness strategies, and the context of the use. We validate the framework by analysing and presenting a set of six existing systems and prototypes in light of this framework, and show how they take into account the central design attributes. As a conclusion, we propose that this framework can be used to assist in designing and evaluating the user interfaces of CMC systems for emotional communication to support LDRs.

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Acknowledgements

This work has received funding from the China Scholarship Council fellowship (201606150085).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland

    Hong Li & Jonna Häkkilä

  2. Tampere University, Tampere, Finland

    Kaisa Väänänen

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  1. Hong Li
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  2. Jonna Häkkilä
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  3. Kaisa Väänänen
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Correspondence to Hong Li .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Architecture, Design and Media Technology, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Anthony Brooks

  2. Department of Culture and Learning, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Eva Irene Brooks

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Li, H., Häkkilä, J., Väänänen, K. (2020). Towards a Conceptual Design Framework for Emotional Communication Systems for Long-Distance Relationships. In: Brooks, A., Brooks, E. (eds) Interactivity, Game Creation, Design, Learning, and Innovation. ArtsIT DLI 2019 2019. Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, vol 328. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53294-9_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53294-9_8

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